Electronic Arts and Nvidia, Friends Forever XOXOXO

You are here

EA, continuing in their proud tradition of Challenging Everything, has challenged Nvidia to be the primary graphics platform for all upcoming Electronic Arts titles. Nvidia, not surprisingly, agreed that becoming the primary graphics platform for the publishing juggernaut was probably not a bad idea. Out of the deal, Nvidia gets exclusive OEM bundling rights to package Electronic Arts games with their hardware. Read on for some specifics.

Under terms outlined by their agreement, NVIDIA hardware will become the preferred PC graphics platform for EA's worldwide studios to give its developers the best solution for realizing their creative visions. EA development teams will use PCs powered by NVIDIA GPUs to create eye-popping 3D effects while allowing full compatibility across all PC gaming systems featuring NVIDIA hardware. NVIDIA and EA will also discuss opportunities to implement NVIDIA-specific features and special effects in several upcoming EA titles such as Madden NFL Football 2004 and others for the PC platform.

NVIDIA also announced that it has been awarded the exclusive OEM bundling rights to certain EA PC titles. Under terms of the agreement, NVIDIA will act as sole OEM distributor of certain PC titles published under the EA Games and EA Sports brands, bundling select content with its PC manufacturer and system builder partners.

One has to immediately wonder what support Radeon users will get for their Electronic Arts games in the future. Considering how often problems develop and patches are necessary for increasingly complex rendering, is this ultimately a way for Electronic Arts to establish a standard that they will pursue and a fashion by which they can excuse themselves from unnecessary support? In other words, if Battlefield 1945 works beautifully for the brand new GeForce 6, but experiences crashes with the Radeon 10700, will we see resources put toward a fix, or will we simply see them refer us to Nvidia's assertion that it is already performing 'The Way It Was Meant To Be Played'?

"Electronic Arts has a tremendous track record for developing games that can be enjoyed by consumers of all ages and both the hardcore and casual gamer alike. By exclusively adopting NVIDIA hardware for their worldwide studios, EA is escalating the creative palette of its 3D artists and programmers," said Dan Vivoli, executive vice president of marketing at NVIDIA. "Our FX family of GPUs were designed to usher in an era of cinematic computing, and we couldn't be more thrilled that EA has signed on to help us meet our goal."

And just when you guys were getting all excited about some serious competition from ATI. Think for a moment about how many Electronic Arts games you own. Now think if you're buying a new video card, one of which will play EA games, the other will not. Despite how you feel about EA or Nvidia, which one are you going to buy?